Con Crud, Community, Craziness: Elizabeth Ann’s Comic-Con 2012 Experience

AFC contributor Elizabeth Ann shares her Comic-Con 2012 experiences, and AFC editor Alex Langley shares his pics.

San Diego Comic-con 2012 has come and gone, leaving in its wake a population of nerds who showed up for their real lives with variations of Con Crud, tendonitis, and sleep deprivation so severe they’ll be better off staying up a few more days before taking a long weekend to recover. For those not in attendance, the various social media outlets provided a constant stream of information from who showed up and what announcements were made to the most up to date pictures and information regarding hotly anticipated offerings. I was one of the many who managed to score passes and was able to wander the hallowed halls of geekery, take in the ambiance and information, and fight my way through the crowds. It’s that last point that makes me consider carefully whether attending SDCC is worth it. For the most part yes. Initially, I had planned to be penning several quick interview pieces for this entry but alas they fell through in the end. Instead of fighting schedules and attempting to reschedule or find new interviewees, I’ve opted to provide an internal view of SDCC.

Let’s start with the crowds… I first attended SDCC in 2008, with my older brother. He’d been attending off and on since the late 80’s- if I recall correctly- and thus could be my guide through a weekend of geek insanity. Neither of us were prepared for the crowd. You hear “one hundred thousand people”, but it doesn’t actually register until you walk in. And it’s just grown like wildfire since that first trip. You expect there to be blocks in the exhibit hall, so the crowds there are no big deal- who doesn’t like to get free stuff from the studios, right? But the lines for some of the panels are ridiculous. I was in the line on Friday for Ballroom 20 (panels that day included Community, the Firefly reunion, Bones, Arrow, and eventually Joss Whedon)- waited for 5 hours before I finally got into the room. When I got into the line, I was down around the back of the convention center, around the park, and out by the water. I was no where near the front of the line. Nor the back. I’m not saying I shouldn’t have had to wait, but there really should be some sort of con rules that you can’t line up before like… 8am. Give those who want/need a good nights sleep a chance! I’m not going to mention that bathrooms are limited in the area or that those who waited in line since the previous day probably hadn’t showered… Anyways… lines and crowds. I’m going to be really honest- I passed up on seeing a lot of panels because the idea of having to wait in another line made every joint in my body threaten to abandon ship. I bow down in awe of those who did it multiple times.

I will say this- I had some of the most fun conversations while in that line. The group of people immediately around us turned out to be very cool. And snarky. Together we practiced our death glares on those in the line in front of us and cheered whenever someone gave up on waiting, bailing out of the line. Random discussions with topics ranging from Cards Against Humanity to Game of Throne kept us all sane. Well, semi-sane; we still all stayed in line until we got into the room.

One thing that is truly awesome about SDCC (and conventions in general) is the cosplaying. Virtually everywhere you look is someone dressed as a favorite character. The challenge is figuring out who they are! I’m good with the well known comics or film/TV show characters, but the upsurge in anime over the last few decades has created a vast array of characters that I have no clue about. Some of the costumes are absolutely amazing! If nothing else, SDCC is a great people watching venue because if you just sit and wait, Pimp Bobba Fett will walk by with a Batgirl or a gaggle of Sailor Moons or Fem Thor (which there were a ton of- though I saw no guys dressed as Thor). If you live your life by what you see, then Firefly’s Malcolm Reynolds is going to the “special hell” based on a dalliance with a YoSaffBrig that produced a baby (i.e. adorable browncoat cosplayers). A memorable cosplay group had the dad dressed as Tony Stark from Iron Man 2 (racing suit), child dressed as Whiplash, and mom as one of the Iron Maidens from the opening scenes of the film; extremely well done costumes. And the Sand People! Oh how I wish I had gotten photos of the Sand People!

I should point out that on top of the free swag available around every corner and the people watching, SDCC is full of panels. Sometimes up to 18 panels were occurring at any given time. Detailed studying of the programming guide is a must in order to attempt to plan out what and who you want to see. This year I made it to seven full panels, two ¾s full panels, and one Buffy Singalong. I’ve made it to more panels in the past but… the lines were worse this year. Thursdays’ two panels both involved Action Flick Chick’s own Katrina Hill. The first, Once More, with Comics: How the Whedon Universes Continue in Comic Book Form, gave a great look into the comics growth and how the Buffy storyline (and the other Whedonverses) continue on. My personal favorite moment was Tom Lenk’s declaration regarding a boyfriend for “Andrew”, “I choose Spike.” I’m behind on my Buffy comics so I’ve already blocked out anything said about the stories… keep me spoiler free! The second, The Most Dangerous Women at Comic-Con, featured Adrienne Curry as Raptor Jesus and several other women probably most famous online for their blogs or outspoken personalities. This panel left the audience in stitches and empowered to continue the movement of women in the geek world. Girl Power! I also made it to the Bones, Arrow, and Joss panels… each one should be available online somewhere, so I’ll save writing them up in favor of this- Bones: season 8 should be darker; Arrow: intrigues me and I want to see a few episodes before I give it a thumbs up or down; and Joss: well, there’s a reason the saying “Joss Whedon is my master now” came about. The Buffy 20^th anniversary panel was also a laugh riot, though it should have been retitled the “Buffy Boys, with special guest Jane Espenson”, because Kristy Swanson had to cancel and was replaced with Randall Batinkoff who joined Nicholas Brendon, James Marsters, Scott Allie, Georges Jeanty, and the previously mentioned Espenson. For anyone who doesn’t know- Nick works “blue” and thus no children should ever be in attendance for his panels; but for everyone else, it’s always a good time when you get James and Nick together. Again, this is probably online somewhere so I’ll save the write up, especially since other than season 9 and 10 (comics), there isn’t much beyond personal stories to share. I will note that Marsters made a comment about how he felt like the writers “were making love” to the characters through the scripts and the actors made love to the writers through their performances, and it was just a big orgy. To which Espenson responded, “yes”. Which led to Brendon chiming in that he “just f*cked my script” (complete with miming…). Cue panel giggles and Marsters hiding his face on the table. The only issue I had with this panel was the end quiz. The idea was spot on, but it lacked organization and thus failed in implementation. Oh well… next time. (I’d like to have seen the panelists be quizzed, though it might be risky if they didn’t know the answer- not sure what would come out if Brendon was faking it).

I tweeted that “you truly haven’t lived til you’ve properly nerded out at a Buffy singalong with a huge room full of nerds! (even my brother sings)”. This statement has never been truer than while sitting in a huge hall with thousands of other fans and belting out the lyrics to one of televisions finest hours. Though, it’s clear to me that many in the audience had never attended a concert before as they held their cellphones the wrong direction when they raised them (thus blinding the rest of the audience). And it is particularly amusing to see lightsabers raised in salute.

A few final thoughts from me- one of the great things about spending time on the exhibit hall floor isn’t just the mounds of swag you can score but the opportunity to chat with a) other fans, b) creators, actors, artists, musicians, etc, or c) people who fit into both of the above. I had the chance to talk to Yuri Lowenthal and Tara Platt (who I just interviewed for Action Flick Chick), touching base on their adventures at SDCC. I’m pretty sure they hadn’t slept once when I talked to them on Saturday. I was tweeted to return to a booth because I’d missed an opportunity to chat with Marian Call- an Alaskan based singer/songwriter. We discussed various things but mostly her current kickstarter campaign and the trials and tribulations of being an independent artist. Though she did leave me with one quote I want to share- “local beer good, corporate beer bad”, so consider yourself properly informed now. I have spent the last few months writing posts regarding Cinemax’s Femme Fatales, so it was a pleasure to see Catherine Annette and Madison Dylan again. There may or may not have been a swag trade off. I’m not admitting anything. And a true highlight was getting to say hello to a gentlemen I’ve had several twitter conversations with ranging from psychology to banana bread- J. August Richards (“Gunn” from Angel). Goodness gracious… he is tall. And oh so sweet! Always a pleasure to meet someone and have them turn out to be as good a person as they present themselves to be, ya know? I highly recommend saying hi to him if you get the chance.

What I’m trying to say is this- SDCC is an amazing experience, whether you’re there for a day, the whole weekend, or watching it at home. There are great highlights, but also some serious downsides- things that, sadly, aren’t likely to be fixed anytime soon. I think the most important thing is have a “whatever” attitude and just go with the flow- if you care too much about one thing and it doesn’t work out, you’ll miss everything else that could happen. I would’ve missed some of the great moments that I had if my schedule had remained as it originally was. And sure, I missed stuff I really wanted to see, but I got to photobomb Seth Green and Geoff Johns, so I call it a win.